International Adoption Travel Tips

Several Overseas Adoption Travel Tips

Travelling to offshore destinations can be fun and enriching. If you are traveling for leisure, the experience could be worthwhile. But what if you are taking a journey to process a tedious activity of adopting? The process of adopting is already complicated within your country, and adopting in other countries could be twice as exhilarating.

Overseas adoption is rapidly rising. That is because the availability of infants and children for adoption in the United States and in other developed countries is significantly declining. Statistics show that there are about 20,000 United States citizens and couples who adopt internationally every year.

Global figures have it that about 75% of infants and children adopted by international parents come from countries like Ukraine, South Korea, Guatemala, Russia and China. Take note that in such countries, different travel requirements have to be processed.

Overseas adoption travel is a general phrase referring to three different types of travel for adoption, namely, pre-adoption, actual adoption and heritage trips. Here are some guidelines that will help you get over these imperative types of travels for your overseas adoption initiative.

Pre-adoption travel. This type of overseas adoption travel is taken prior to the actual adoption or while processing the transaction. You have to immerse yourself to the culture of the country where your adopted child will be coming from. For such visits, it would be of great help if you would read travel books and spend some time getting to know the culture of the country. Doing this will give you a feel of how more responsibly you could raise the child. Thus, when the child asks in the future about his or her homeland, you readily offer a good answer.

Adoption trip. You could choose to arrange for a setup wherein the child would be escorted by authorities to your country. Currently, only South Korea is known to take such measures. In most cases, adoption agencies will require you to personally travel to the country to complete the adoption. You will be asked to fill out a lot of papers, so beforehand, make sure your travel documents are well taken care of. This will help you save time and effort.

Heritage trips. A visit to the homeland of the child in the future will help give your adopted child a sense of his or her own cultural identity. For such trips, plan the destinations and specific tourist sites you will visit. A trip to other areas within the country would also be helpful.